Читать онлайн «Christmas Cowboy: Will of Steel / Winter Roses»
Автор Palmer Diana
Two fantastic novels from
DIANA PALMER
including the all-new story
About the Author
With more than forty million copies of her books in print, DIANA PALMER is one of North America’s most beloved authors and considered one of the top ten romance authors in the United States.
Diana’s hobbies include gardening, archaeology, anthropology and music. She has been married to James Kyle for over thirty-five years. They have one son, Blayne, who is married to the former Christina Clayton, and a granddaughter, Selena Marie.
Christmas Cowboy
Diana Palmer
Will of Steel
Winter Roses
To the readers, all of you, many of whom are my friends
on my Facebook page. You make this job wonderful
and worthwhile. Thank you for your kindness and
your support and your affection through all
the long years. I am still your biggest fan.
One
He never liked coming here. The stupid calf followed him around, everywhere he went. He couldn’t get the animal to leave him alone. Once, he’d whacked the calf with a soft fir tree branch, but that had led to repercussions. Its owner had a lot to say about animal cruelty and quoted the law to him. He didn’t need her to quote the law. He was, after all, the chief of police in the small Montana town where they both lived.
Technically, of course, this wasn’t town. It was about two miles outside the Medicine Ridge city limits. A small ranch in Hollister, Montana, that included two clear, cold trout streams and half a mountain.
Her uncle and his uncle had owned it jointly during their lifetimes. The two of them, best friends forever, had recently died, his uncle from a heart attack and hers, about a month later, in an airplane crash en route to a cattleman’s convention. The property was set to go up on the auction block, and a California real estate developer was skulking in the wings, waiting to put in the winning bid. He was going to build a rich man’s resort here, banking on those pure trout streams to bring in the business.If Hollister Police Chief Theodore Graves had his way, the man would never set foot on the property. She felt that way, too. But the wily old men had placed a clause in both their wills pertaining to ownership of the land in question. The clause in her uncle’s will had been a source of shock to Graves and the girl when the amused attorney read it out to them. It had provoked a war of words every time he walked in the door.
“I’m not marrying you,” Jillian Sanders told him firmly the minute he stepped on the porch. “I don’t care if I have to live in the barn with Sammy. ”
Sammy was the calf.
He looked down at her from his far superior height with faint arrogance. “No problem. I don’t think the grammar school would give you a hall pass to marry me anyway. ”
